Interesting articles

ERU to travel inHeli. Army AW139 is supposed to , but availability is an issue because of the Athlone operation. Ergo, they go it alone. They may even get a "Garda" 139. Plenty of space for all the kit.

“New Aircraft have lower environmental impact with the new replacement helicopter expected to reduce CO2 emissions by up to 80 per cent” why do they feel the need to add that green hippy bit into the presser 🤦‍♂️ anyway given they made a point of adding that in, I would say the H225 is a contender as it is the first ever Airbus helicopter to have 100% sustained aviation fuel.(according to the website)

Eamon Ryan suggested “a colourful hat with a little propellor on it, however it was overturned as it would cost too much to provide one to each member of the ERU and ASU”(I made this up but fully convinced it was tabled)

A little rant by Mr Tobin below. With ATCP near enoght going to be binned. Does army numbers need to he worried about?

The Air Corps and the Navy we all know need more numbers but with the army atcp role gone that should ease alot pressure on them

The Mirror is saying the new GASU helicopter will be a H145 and carry 10 ERU members. A H145 fitted out with all the normal survelliance kit and then 10 Fully equiped ERU members to fit in. Would not be a tight fit?

Airbus are supplying a H-145 with the police kit included in the avionics package. In the current EC135 it all sits in a pod under the fuselage, dramatically reducing payload. Presumably Airbus knows what it means when it says "1 or 2 pilots and up to 10 passengers" in its information leaflets?

Normal GASU crew is 1 pilot plus 2 observer/operators.

H145 technical information | Airbus

Helicity operate 139 passenger service from Algeciras to Ceuta with 9 passengers.

Baggage?

Great.

Maybe you will explain why we don't have Blackhawks so.

Are you joking?

This isn't a box of biros. High value players like Leonardo and Airbus employ battalions of lawyers who spend their whole lives doing nothing but overseeing tender activity in the market and bringing the legal sledgehammer down on the mere sniff of collusive tendering, which is official term for what you're suggesting.

Those companies will not give a second thought to turning a government upside down and having all their spare change as compensation and then still end up winning the inevitable rerun of the tender competition.

Yes, the Airbus H145 would be the ballpark of what AGS want, but Leonardo will be pulling up trees trying to get in under them with the AW169 and heck, even Sikorsky might offer the S-76+.

AGS will get the aircraft which meets their requirements (all else being equal) and not the other way around.

We don't have to go as far as that. Just cast our minds back to when Sikorsky won the Medium Utility Heli contract, and Eurocopter kicked up a fuss because Sikorsky had included offsets and If Eurocopter knew that they could have offered their Cougar at a better price, and before AW had time to wade in with their lawyers too, the Minister at the time cancelled the contract completely, and we still have not got Medium Utility Helis, 20 odd years later.

Probably not. But since when has Government procurement delivered much of anything on time?

It does seem odd to make themselves a hostage to fortune on lead times, I mean we know the PC12s (bar one) and 295s took every minute of their 2 and 3 year contracted times to be delivered and those were orders placed before Covid.

Maybe they said it because it sounds like a gung-ho thing to say, but they know the general public couldn't give a shyte about such things, if it is much later.

https://www.irishtimes.com/ireland/2023/01/07/naval-service-may-begin-searching-overseas-for-skilled-sailors/

They talk about actually enlisting/commissioning people from abroad into the NS...like how does that work. To get good talent you'll have to pay more then what the NS pays now, so we'll have a 2 tier system where for want of a better term "mercenaries" will be paid better then actual Irish NS sailors?

And if you don't pay better then that you get what a glorified ferry service just hiring Filipino and Indonesian sailors at barely minimm age...at that stage it's not the Irish Naval Service anymore...

That's a good idea! Could fill some of the gaps and help restore the NS institutional memory in engineering matters.

Pension Abatement is the issue there. Why would you come back if you lose all the pension entitlements you worked 20 years to get?